Barcelona day 3: Maldonado leads for Williams

Pastor Maldonado headed the third day of testing at the Circuit de Catalunya.

The Venezuelan driver set his fastest time early in the morning, and was almost a second faster than second-placed Michael Schumacher. Kamui Kobayashi ran out of fuel on track during the day, but still finished in 3rd.

Jenson Button, Mark Webber and Felipe Massa all replaced their teammates for today’s and tomorrow’s testing. They finished 4th, 5th and 7th repectively.

The Red Bull team suffered a difficult day to say the least. After their new wheel guns proved to be unreliable in the morning, Webber’s RB8 stopped out on track with an hour to go, and was immediately hidden away by the Red Bull mechanics. It is unclear what caused the stoppage, but reports from Barcelona indicate that the team have left the test session early, and will not return for tomorrow’s final test.

Paul di Resta lost his engine cover during the day, while Vitaly Petrov’s Caterham was halted by suspension issues. Timo Glock replaced Charles Pic at Marussia, setting the 9th fastest time, ahead of Petrov.